Off The Ground: Creating The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial

The memorial to the Rev. Martin Luther King opens on the National Mall this week after 25 years of planning and more than $100 million.

Allison KeyesNPR

The new Martin Luther King Jr. National Memorial is scheduled to be dedicated on Aug. 28 — the anniversary of the civil rights leader's "I Have A Dream" speech. The memorial, located on the Tidal Basin in Washington, D.C., was several decades in the making. Here's a brief look at how the idea for a memorial came to fruition.